Rice M L, Wexler K, Hershberger S
University of Kansas, Lawrence 66045-2930, USA.
J Speech Lang Hear Res. 1998 Dec;41(6):1412-31. doi: 10.1044/jslhr.4106.1412.
Tense marking in English is relatively late appearing and is especially late for children with Specific Language Impairment (SLI). Little is known about the full course of acquisition for this set of morphemes. Because tense marking is a fundamental property of clause construction, it is central to current theories of morphosyntax and language acquisition. A longitudinal study is reported that encompasses the years of 2;6-8;9 years for typically developing children (N = 43) and 4;6-8;8 years for children with SLI (N = 21). The findings show that a diverse set of morphemes share the property of tense marking; that this set is not mastered until age 4 years in typically developing children and after 7 years for children with SLI; that acquisition shows linear and nonlinear components for both groups, in a typical S-shaped curve; and that nonsyntactic measures are not predictors of growth (including nonverbal intelligence, vocabulary size, and mother's education), whereas initial MLU does predict rate of acquisition. The findings are consistent with a model of Optional Infinitives (OI) for typically developing children (cf. Wexler, 1994, 1996) and Extended Optional Infinitives (EOI) for children with SLI. This model hypothesizes incomplete specification of features of tense that are represented in the grammar.
英语中的时态标记出现得相对较晚，对于特定语言障碍（SLI）儿童来说尤其晚。对于这组语素的完整习得过程，人们了解得很少。由于时态标记是从句结构的一个基本属性，它在当前的形态句法和语言习得理论中处于核心地位。本文报告了一项纵向研究，该研究涵盖了2;6至8;9岁的正常发育儿童（N = 43）以及4;6至8;8岁的SLI儿童（N = 21）。研究结果表明，一组多样的语素具有时态标记属性；在正常发育儿童中，这组语素直到4岁才被掌握，而对于SLI儿童则是在7岁之后；两组儿童的习得都呈现出线性和非线性成分，呈典型的S形曲线；并且非句法测量指标不是增长的预测因素（包括非言语智力、词汇量和母亲的教育程度），而初始平均语句长度（MLU）确实可以预测习得速度。这些发现与正常发育儿童的可选不定式（OI）模型（参见Wexler，1994，1996）以及SLI儿童的扩展可选不定式（EOI）模型一致。该模型假设语法中表示的时态特征存在不完全规范。
